Governors
Chairman
Mrs Jayne Adams, BA (Joint Hons) CPE
Jayne Adams joined the Governing Body in 2009 and became Chairman in 2015. She was educated at Edinburgh Academy, the University of Durham, from where she holds a BA (Joint Honours) in French and Italian, and the College of Law. A practising solicitor since 2003, she is a partner at McCarthy Denning, principally advising charities of all shapes and sizes on charity law and practice, constitutional and governance matters. She also runs her own consultancy. Jayne undertook her solicitor training at BDB Pitman (then Bircham Dyson Bell) and spent more than ten years at the firm, practising charity law. Prior to joining the legal profession, she worked in international conference organising. An experienced trustee and non-executive, Jayne came to know Walthamstow Hall through her work and is delighted to serve on the Governing Body.
Vice Chairman
Dr Nigel Jepps, BA Hons, MA, PhD, FRSC
Nigel Jepps joined the Governing Body in January 2013. He was appointed Chairman of the Premises Committee in January 2014 and became Vice Chair in January 2016. He was educated at Oakham School, Ludlow Grammar School and Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge. He holds an MA in Natural Sciences and a PhD in Materials Science. Following three years post-doctoral research at Cambridge University, Nigel joined Unilever as a Research Scientist. His career in Unilever involved twelve years working in France, where he was appointed to the Board of Elida Fabergé, France. He moved back to the UK to take up the position of Vice-President of Research and Development for Unilever’s global Hair Care business. Nigel also holds a BA Hons in Politics, Philosophy and Economics from the Open University. He has lived in Sevenoaks for fifteen years and has two children who were educated in both France and the UK. Nigel is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry.
Mrs Christine Crosley, BSc
Christine Crosley joined the Governing Body in February 2019. She studied at a Grammar School near Wigan, and has a BSc in Economics from the University of Bristol. Christine has over 35 years of commercial experience, gained primarily from working in Shell’s Oil Trading Division, where she traded physical cargoes of oil before developing the company’s derivatives trading & price risk management business. Following her retirement from Shell, Christine continues to maintain links with the oil industry via her position on ICE Futures’ Brent Oversight Committee. Outside of professional work, she is the team manager of both the England U18 Girls’ Squad as well as Sevenoaks Hockey Club’s Ladies’ 1st XI. She is a Vice-President of Sevenoaks Hockey Club and sits on a number of its committees. She has two daughters, both of whom attended Independent Schools in south London. Mrs Crosley became the nominated Link Governor for Careers in late 2020.
James Froud, LLB (Hons), LPC
James Froud joined the Governing Body in January 2020 as a parent-nominated Governor. He was brought up in Sevenoaks and has lived in the town for most of his life, attending Sevenoaks Primary School and then Tunbridge Wells Boys Grammar, before reading law at Southampton University. He qualified as a solicitor in 2002 with Eversheds, specialising in HR and employment matters, then moved to Bird & Bird in 2006, where he was made partner in 2014. He is now partner and Head of Employment at McCarthy Denning, advising businesses and individuals across many industries on a range of sensitive workplace issues. He has two daughters; one in the Junior School and one in the Senior School, each having started at the nursery.
James is the nominated Safeguarding Governor.
Peter Gloyne, MA
Peter Gloyne became a Governor in 2003 and currently serves as Chairman of the Finance Committee. He was educated at St Edward’s College, Liverpool and Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge and holds an MA in Economics. Peter has worked in the banking industry for 34 years and has lived in Sevenoaks for 16 years with all three of his daughters having attended Walthamstow Hall. He is also Chairman of the Trustees of the Northern Trust Company Employee Retirement Plan.
Simon Heather, BA, PGCE
Simon Heather studied Economics and Management at Corpus Christi College, Oxford before joining The Judd School, Tonbridge in the mathematics department. After two years at The Judd, Simon taught maths and lectured economics at Holborn College in London, until 2006 when he joined the full-time staff at St Nicholas Church, Sevenoaks, in his current role as Youth Minister. For several years he has been a regular speaker at prayers in the Senior School at Walthamstow Hall.
Mrs Janet Joynes BA Hons, PGCE, NPQH
Janet Joynes became the staff-nominated Governor in January 2016. Formerly Senior Deputy Head at Walthamstow Hall for twelve years until her retirement, Janet was educated at grammar schools in Wrexham and Bury St Edmunds and read History at Southampton University. Her teaching career spanned forty years, mainly in the state sector, including schools in inner London, Tonbridge and Hong Kong. She is very interested in all sporting matters and represented GSA schools in the south-east on the GSA Sports Committee. Janet has two children – a son and a daughter – and lives locally. Her focus on the Governing Body is on teaching standards and sporting excellence.
Dr Clare Kevis BSc, MSc, D Clin Psychol, AFBPsS
Clare Kevis joined the Governing Body in 2008. She was educated at public/grammar school and qualified as a Clinical Psychologist in 1983
(Newcastle University and the University of East London). In 2002 she completed an Open University post qualification doctorate.
She has worked for Guy’s and Lewisham Oxleas NHS Trusts and for St Andrew’s Healthcare, a charitable organisation.
Since 1995 she has maintained a small private practice. She is also a vicar’s wife and has an interest in spirituality/disability. Her daughter attended Walthamstow Senior School where she was appointed as Head Girl in 2006/2007.
Mrs Sarah Lewis-Davies BA
Sarah Lewis-Davies joined the Governing Body in 2017. She was educated at St. Margaret’s School for Girls, Aberdeen, and the University of Edinburgh, where she read General Arts. After graduating, she worked in advertising and public relations in Edinburgh, and after an extended period at a subsidiary of Saatchi & Saatchi she set up her own public relations consultancy. When her husband’s work took the family from Edinburgh to Paris, she focused on bringing up a young family. Whilst in Paris she helped to teach English to French school children at the local school where her daughters attended the maternelle section. On return to the UK, her two daughters attended Walthamstow Hall Junior School and Sarah was involved in the Friends & Parents Association. Until July 2018, Sarah worked as a teaching assistant at her son’s former prep school in Sevenoaks where, in addition to classroom support, she ran small groups for boys with English as an additional language (EAL).
Mrs Janet Mitchell BSc (Hons), MSc, PGCE
Janet Mitchell joined the Governing Body in September 2022. Following her secondary education at Cheadle Hulme School in Cheshire, she gained her degree in Biochemistry at The University of Bristol in 1982 and followed this with a PGCE qualification from The University of Oxford (1983). More recently, she was awarded an MSc in Science (focusing on Medicinal Chemistry and Medical Physics) from the Open University in 2013. Now retired from teaching, her 38-year career in independent schools included academic, pastoral and leadership positions in co-educational, all-girls and all-boys schools in the UK as well as a year on a teacher exchange in Melbourne, Australia. Most recent positions include Academic Deputy Head at Bristol Grammar School (1999-2004) and then Deputy Head (Academic) at Wimbledon High School (GDST) (2004-2015). Immediately prior to retirement, she taught Chemistry for four and a half years at St Paul’s School, London where she also contributed to the Careers and Universities programme (advising students and supporting UCAS applications) and supported the Admissions Department in the interviewing of prospective pupils. Having always been a keen sportswoman, she sees the value of the contributions that a range of sporting and non-sporting co-curricular activities play in developing our young people and is also particularly interested in the ways in which schools prepare their pupils to be ambitious and resilient independent learners. She is a trained ISI inspector (now retired) and a current Cadet Force Adult Volunteer (Royal Navy) who has assisted in the organisation of CCF (RN) summer camps for many years. Janet is married to Bob, also a teacher of Chemistry.
Stephen Swift MA
Stephen Swift became a Governor in 2022. Stephen was born and brought up in Derbyshire and attended John Port School, Etwall, Derbyshire before reading Modern and Medieval Languages at Gonville & Caius College Cambridge. After a short stint with a UK Bank, Stephen spent his career with Société Générale, a major French bank, in their Corporate & investment Banking Division. His specialisation in the Bank has been Syndicated and Leveraged Finance where he held positions with global responsibility, managing teams across the world. Stephen has worked in London, Zurich, Paris (for thirteen years) and most recently for five years in the Bank’s Hong Kong office from where he was responsible for the Bank’s Global Banking & Finance Division for the Asia Pacific Region. Stephen retired from Société Générale in December 2021 and now holds two Non-Executive Director positions with two wholly owned subsidiaries of the Bank. In terms of school governance, he was Vice President of the British Section of the Lycée International in St Germain-en-Laye near Paris during his stay there and was a Local Authority Governor of a state primary school in Tower Hamlets before going to Hong Kong. Stephen has lived in Sevenoaks since 2006 and has two sons and a daughter educated in France, the UK and now Ireland.
Micaela West BA
Micaela West joined the Governing Board as a Parent Governor in February 2022. Micaela’s daughter completed her A levels in the Summer of 2022, having attended Walthamstow Hall School from the age 3. Micaela was educated in the Northwest of England (Birkenhead High School GDST), studied Law and Sociology at the University of Warwick, and was called to the Bar at Gray’s Inn in 1988. She spent 18 years working as an in-house lawyer within a number of international investment banks in London, gaining exposure along the way to various different working cultures. Her work experience was broad and varied and involved much interdisciplinary co-operation with colleagues in the UK and overseas. Micaela relocated to Kent 17 years ago. Since then, she has been a stay-at-home mum who edits a local parish magazine in a village outside of Sevenoaks. Micaela writes, “As a parent who has come all the way through Wally Hall, I am totally committed to the concept of the School. I see my role as a strong and informed advocate.”
Governors Emeritus
Sir Jeremy Elwes, CBE, ACIS, FRSA
P Hewlett Esq, MA
I Philip Esq, FCA
Bursar and Clerk to the Governors
P A Horner Esq, MBA, CMgr, FCMI
Please address correspondence for Mrs Adams to chairofgovernors@whall.school
or to
Mrs J Adams, Chair of Governors, c/o Walthamstow Hall, Holly Bush Lane, Sevenoaks, TN13 3UL
